Every founder hits a wall. The question isn't whether it happens, it's what you do when it does.
Sometimes the answer comes from the unlikeliest place. For one Scottish king, hiding in a cave after a series of defeats, it came from watching a spider.
In this issue, I'll cover why the moment before you quit is one of most important moments in your story, plus:
3 storytelling lessons from the king and the spider
A fun fact about grit, resilience, and what science says about not giving up
·A video that captures a method to keep on keeping on
Enjoy learning what a persistent spider can teach us all… LG
Founder Parable: The King & the Spider
In the early 1300s, Scotland was not yet part of England. It was its own country with its own crown. And England wanted to change that.
King Edward I of England, also known as Edward Longshanks, pressed hard to bring Scotland under his rule. He had the army. He had the money. He had the numbers. Scotland had none of those things. What it had was a man named Robert Bruce.
Bruce claimed the Scottish throne during one of the most violent periods in the country’s history. He knew exactly what that meant. War against a far larger, better-funded, and more disciplined English army. He chose it anyway.
DEFEAT AFTER DEFEAT
The king of England marched his massive forces north into Scotland, determined to crush Bruce and end Scottish resistance for good. Bruce refused to surrender his country. With limited resources, he gathered a small group of loyal men and chose to fight.
Robert the Bruce
Again and again, he rallied what forces he could and met England on the battlefield. Each time, the result was the same. His army fought with courage but suffered heavy defeats. One campaign after another ended in retreat. His men scattered to survive.
Six times Bruce raised an army. Six times he lost.
Each defeat cost him soldiers, allies, and credibility. The men who once believed in his cause grew harder to find. The lords who once backed his claim drifted away. After the sixth loss, Scotland’s resistance appeared finished. Bruce himself became a hunted king with no army left to lead.
With no forces and no clear path forward, Bruce fled to save his life. He hid in deep woods and remote mountain places, moving from one shelter to the next, trying not to be captured, trying not to give up hope.
He wandered alone. Growing weaker. Growing more discouraged with each passing day.
One day, a heavy storm broke. Rain poured down in sheets. Searching for shelter, Bruce found an empty cave. He crawled inside, collapsed on the cold ground, and lay there, exhausted and sick at heart.
He believed it was over. Six attempts. Six failures. There was no point in trying again.
THE DEFIANT SPIDER
As Bruce lay on the cave floor, listening to the rainfall outside, he noticed a spider above his head. She was trying to spin a web, stretching a thin thread from one side of the cave wall to the other.
The thread broke. She fell.
She climbed back up and tried again. The thread fell short. She tried a third time. Failed. A fourth. A fifth. A sixth.
Six times the spider attempted to stretch her thread across the cave. Six times she failed.
Bruce watched with a strange sadness. He saw himself in her struggle. Six failures for her. Six for him. He almost forgot his own troubles, fixed on this tiny creature working above him in the dark.
THE SEVENTH ATTEMPT
The spider did not stop. After six failures, she adjusted. She moved to the opposite side of the cave wall, repositioned herself, and tried from a different direction.
Bruce held his breath.
She swung out on the slender line. The thread caught. It held. The spider fastened it to the far wall and began to build her web.
“If a spider can keep trying without giving up, then so can I.”
When the rain stopped, the king of Scotland stood up, walked out of the cave, and said five words that changed his country’s history.
“I will try a seventh time.”
RECLAIMING A KINGDOM
He began gathering his supporters again and shared his plans, speaking with conviction shaped by failure. He urged his followers to bring others who were still willing to fight for Scotland, even after so many defeats.
Men returned, not because victory was certain, but because belief had been restored. They followed Bruce not just as a king, but as someone who had failed, learned, and refused to quit.
What began as a scattered resistance slowly became a determined force.
Soon, a new Scottish army stood ready to face England once more. Against all odds, King Bruce led them into battle and emerged victorious. Scotland reclaimed its independence, and Bruce reclaimed his kingdom.
Robert the Bruce became a legend not because he won a battle, but because he chose to try again when everything pointed toward surrender.
More than eight hundred years later, his story is still told, not for the crown he wore, but for the moment he decided not to quit.
Storytelling Lessons: The Cave Before The Crown
The moment that changed Robert the Bruce did not happen on a battlefield. It happened alone, in a cave, watching a spider fail again and again. That small scene carried more power than any victory that came after it. The same is true for founders. The stories that move people rarely come from the win. They come from the moment right before you decided not to quit.
One Image Can Carry the Whole Story
In the cave, Bruce did not need advice or encouragement. He needed a single image that reminded him who he was. The spider became that image.
Sara Blakely tells her founding story the same way. She does not start with market size or manufacturing. She starts with a single moment. Standing in her bathroom, cutting the feet off her pantyhose. That image instantly explains the problem, the scrappy solution, and the insight behind Spanx. You see it. You remember it. You repeat it.
ACTION: Identify one visual moment from your story that explains your idea better than a slide ever could.The Struggle Is the Story People Remember
Bruce won battles later, but history remembers the cave. The doubt. The isolation. The moment he almost quit. That struggle is what gives the victory meaning.
James Dyson did not hide the fact that his vacuum took 5,127 failed prototypes. He led with it. The failures became the hook, not the footnote. By owning the struggle, Dyson made the success believable.
ACTION: Tell one story where things did not work and show what it cost you before it paid off.Turning Points Hide in Small Moments
The spider did not announce itself as a turning point. It was easy to miss. Yet that quiet moment changed everything for Bruce.
Ben Silbermann faced something similar at Pinterest. Early on, growth was painfully slow. Instead of chasing scale, he noticed a small cluster of users in Des Moines who loved the product. He drove out to meet them. He sat in coffee shops and living rooms, watching how they used Pinterest, asking what they wanted more of. That attention to a small signal no one else would have noticed changed the company’s direction.
ACTION: Find the small moment that changed how you thought. Put it in your story. That is your cave.
Fun Fact: The Science of Not Giving Up
Psychologist Angela Duckworth studied over 1,200 West Point cadets and found that grit, not IQ, leadership, or physical ability, was the strongest predictor of who made it through their toughest training. Cadets with higher grit scores were 60% more likely to succeed.
Neuroscience backs this up. Through neuroplasticity, your brain rewires itself every time you push through failure. Each attempt builds new neural pathways.
Video to Watch: One Food In Front of the Other
In this video, I interviewed Clayton Christopher shares what it took to build Sweet Leaf Tea over 15 years before he sold it for nine figures. He tells a story from a brutal cycling race where he was on the edge of collapse, ready to quit, until he kept going, one step at a time. That same mindset carried him through the tough challenges you face as a founder. You feel the pressure, the doubt, and the decision to keep moving. Just like the spider, sometimes the only way through is forward. Watch here:
Clayton Christohper – Founder Sweet Leaf Tea – One Foot in Front of the Other
Need help with your story? I got you.
Send an email to [email protected] and someone from my team will circle back with you.
P.S. This one’s for my BFF as she finally brings her vision to life. #betheONE